The New International Encyclopædia/O'Hara, Theodore

O'HARA, ō̇-hăr′ȧ, Theodore (1820-67). An American poet and soldier, born in Danville, Ky., February 11, 1820. After being educated at Bardstown, he studied law, was admitted to the bar, got an appointment at Washington, entered the army at the beginning of the Mexican War, and was brevetted major for gallantry. Afterwards he practiced law, filibustered in Cuba, performed diplomatic commissions and filled editorial posts, and in the Civil War served as colonel of an Alabama regiment and on staffs. After the war he engaged in the cotton business, but he suffered reverses. His body was removed to Kentucky and buried by the side of the victims of Buena Vista whom he had commemorated in his famous “Bivouac of the Dead,” the only one of his occasional poems that keeps his memory fresh.